Southern standard. (McMinnville, Tenn.) 1879-current, 1887-09-24
A "ME TOO" LETTER FROM UNCLE
JOHNNY.

AS NV INV NAAS
cat is going to jump, and with a
whoop and a bound lands square in
the middle of the anti-prohibition
camp, through a three-column lad
dress" in last Mondays Nashville
American. He smiles c%Omplacently
around upon the faces of the admiring
ants which are upturned to greet
their new acquisition with a welcom-
ing nod, and enthusiastically informs
them, "Why, I've been here all the
time" The Colonel's address is in
dicted "To the People of Warren
County," and yet it is sent a hundred
miles from home to be first published
in the Nashville American, and to be
paid for, we presume, by the Whisky
Protective Association. 1t is a cum
ningly devised screed of demogogue-
ry, a perverted dissertation upon the
powers of the General Assembly as
at present existing in comparison
with the duty of that body should the
amendment be adopted, "a s%uperfuous
degree of contorted reasoning against
the adoption of the amendment,
and a platitudinous array of moral
ethics from Adams time to the pres
ent day. The Colonel argues, by i'm
plication, that the adoption of the
amendment will destroy all Legisla-
tive power of regulation of the whis-
ky traffic, and depicts a very helpless
state of affairs for the people under
the operation of prohibition. Hesays
"the adoption of theamendment adds
nothing to the power of future legisla-
lures to prohibit the manufacture and
sale of liquor" but he fails to tell the
dear people, for whom he processes
much love and great solicitude, that
the adoption of the amendment will
make it the sworn duty of future
Legislatures to prohibit the manufac-
ture and sale of liquor.
In his various migrations to the
State capital as the representative OF
the people of Warren county, "the
old man of the mountains" has never
distinguished himself as an advocate
of that power which the General AS
sembly has, under the present con-
stitution, to prohibit the manufacture
and sale of liquor. After long years
, of failure on the part of oul
| General Assemblies to come up to the
l full measure of their duty under the
l present constitution, the good
people of the State now desire tC
make it nodonger a mere prerogative
. of their servants to exercise the pro.
hibitory power over the whisky traf
: fic, but to say to them you must nou
perform the duties your predecessor
have so long neglected.
The Colonel, following the worn
4 eaten peregrinations of scores of 9th
4 er anti-prohibition apostles, entangle!
himself in the meshes of his owl
fabrication, as nine out of every ter
S of them will do if crowded to thu
e wall. He says: "Inasmuch as tn,
Legislature now has power to pass
prohibition law, is it not better t,
pass it by the Legislature and see tn
effect, and if good then put it in tn
Constitution" The Legislature ha
: passed partial prohibition, and it ha
h proven good. The TOUR mile law ha
+ been in operation sufficiently long 70
s. the people to see the effect, which i
e eminently good, and the prohibition
lists now desire to extend the principl
n contained in the four mile law to tn
s entire State, and put it in the Constitu
d ton. Four-ffths of the people c
n Tennessee will pronounce the fou
e mile law good, and they know b,
d past experience that Legislatures ar
e unreliable, consequently itisdesired t
e. make prohibition the settled polio,
d of the entire State, and make it pei
If petual by ENGRAVING it upon the Oh
ganic law.
is The Colonel sums up his ~conceptio
is of prohibition in these words:
re "Prohibitionists are unwilling t
y trust or abide the popular will. The
n fear their policy, if adopted, woul
- displease the people, and woul
therefore be speedily repealed. The
p seek to get upon the necks of men
" yoke grievous to be borne and diff
n cult to remove. 1t is a snare for tn
=, people, set by cunning political tral
= pers."
! When it is remembered that it
NJ only through the sovereign action
a majority of the people that prohib
u ton can he adopted, the falacy an
n. sophistry of this argument is exposed
= AS a matter of course all who are d
rectly interested in the liquor trait
-